Law Practice Magazine

THE INTERNATIONAL ISSUE

Product Watch

Product Watch

Do you feel the need for speed … in reading, that is? Many of us can remember the advertisements for the Evelyn Wood Reading Dynamics “speed-reading” courses going back to our college days. And these days, there are plenty of advertisements for other speed-reading courses on TV and the Internet. These courses promote different techniques, such as using a finger or other pointer to move at a steady pace under each line of text—but their common promise is to have you reading everything quickly.

Personally, I don’t want to read everything at the same rate. Ideally, shouldn’t we be able to read some documents rapidly, while taking our time and reading other kinds of documents more slowly? This is the concept that motivated Lee Johnson, CEO of MindTalent Inc., to create a family of speed-reading products called HeadCram.

As summed up on the vendor’s Web site, “HeadCram’s interface was designed with the latest in human factors and usability research in mind. In addition to control of the presentation speed, you create your own optimal experience by choosing display settings that enhance your eyes’ ability to quickly scan a page.” HeadCram comes in several versions, including ones for students, enterprises and MS Outlook—and one specifically for lawyers.

HeadCram Legal uses different modes to display the text on the user’s computer screen, including Rapid Serial Visual Presentation (RSVP), which displays one word at a time in rapid sequence, as well as a column view, in which a cursor highlights key text as the user scrolls down the page. (Users should read ahead of the cursor.)

In either mode, the user can control the pace of text at speeds of up to 1,500 words per minute. You can also switch between modes to conform to your particular work flow using the HeadCram application called PUL (which stands for “Pleasure, Utility or Learning”). According to the company, “From quick skimming (case overview) to thorough reading (privilege review, issue classification), HeadCram Legal’s PUL application seamlessly adjusts the reading speed and text display depending on the specific needs of the user.”

The program also allows using both RSVP and the column view simultaneously, placing the RSVP view on the top of the screen and the column view on the bottom. This dual-view is designed to minimize the reading fatigue that can be caused by using just one reading method alone, since it allows users to easily move their eyes between one view and the other.

HeadCram Legal is specifically designed to work with LexisNexis’s Concordance version 8.02 or higher, so it brings the advantage of increased reading and comprehension speeds to electronic discovery and electronic document management. Users can review documents and text from Concordance in HeadCram and also add user-created Concordance Tags by using a right-mouse click and selecting from the context menu that opens. You simply choose the appropriate tag and resume reading. MindTalent claims that you can read and tag up to five times faster than you can by just reading the text on your monitor. HeadCram Legal also works with plain-text documents, and PDF capability is under development for a future release.

Also of interest to lawyers may be the HeadCram for Outlook version (currently in beta), which is unique in that it doesn’t activate for every message as users open their mail. Instead, the software activates only for those messages that are long enough to benefit from speed-reading. The default setting for activation is 500 words, but users can adjust that number through HeadCram’s preferences setting. Also by default, HeadCram for Outlook opens in the dual-mode of RSVP and columniation—this mode, as well as reading speed, can be adjusted via the Message Add-Ins tab.

After using HeadCram over a several-month period to review a number of different document types and e-mails, I’ve found myself reading faster while still maintaining good comprehension. I would like to see the program work with MS Word and WordPerfect documents, or see the PUL’s application brought into Word and Internet Explorer in future versions. Still, in its current form, HeadCram is easier and less expensive than buying and completing one of those Internet speed-reading courses.

About the Author

Nerino J. Petro, Jr., is a legal technologist and Practice Management Advisor for the State Bar of Wisconsin. A former practicing attorney, he blogs on legal technology and practice management issues at www.compujurist.com.

Technology Spotlight

New Microsoft Outlook Tips

The Lawyer’s Guide to Microsoft Outlook 2007 is a new easy-to-read guidebook that helps you get the most out of Microsoft Outlook. Written by Ben Schorr, a 20-year veteran of law office technology, the new ABA LPM Publishing book is filled with insider tips and tricks, as well as mistakes to avoid. Chapters include a full tour of Outlook and its features; comprehensive instruction on e-mailing, handling to-dos, calendaring, managing your contacts and troubleshooting; and using Outlook with the rest of the MS Office suite. You can read a free excerpt and view the entire table of contents at www.ababooks.com.

Product News

Scanning SOS

The temp has misnamed 200 scanned documents. Finding the images for tomorrow’s deposition may call for a crack forensics rescue team. Then there’s the business of complying with the firm’s new document retention policy. Document imaging can be a mind-numbing task, especially when you’re required to endure multiple steps to associate a scanned document with a matter. Mistakes are bound to happen. And when documents are misnamed or misfiled, hours can be wasted in frustrating searches. Legal Files Software Inc.and Fujitsu Computer Products of Americaare aiming to make scanning and storing documents easier by making Legal Files software compatible with Fujitsu’s ScanSnap S510 and S300 desktop scanners. When scanning matter-related documents, mail, images or other items using the ScanSnap scanner, users receive an automatic prompt to associate the scanned item with a particular matter within Legal Files. This integrated, one-step process can significantly reduce the time it takes to scan documents and images into the proper file or matter. And being able to retrieve those documents quickly and accurately can lower the cost of doing business. It may even save a few hours of your summer.

PBX Phone Service for Small Offices

my1voiceis a new virtual PBX phone service from Protus. Designed for home and small offices and mobile professionals, my1voice works with existing phones, so there is no need to purchase hardware. Features include “Find Me/Follow Me” call forwarding, auto-attendant, the option of a local or toll-free phone number, voice-mail services that coincide with e-mail notifications, customized greetings and more.

Mobile Toll-Free Credit Card Processing Service

Accept-By-Phoneis a credit card processing service that aims to make it easy for smaller offices to accept credit cards from anywhere using any touchtone phone—including cell phones. Unlike traditional credit card processing services, this service does not require renting or buying a credit card terminal. Users simply use their phone to call in the credit card transaction and payments are deposited into the user’s checking account within 72 hours. There is a one-time setup fee of less than $100, and a monthly fee of $5. Calls are toll-free and there are no monthly minimum fees, no annual fees, no statement fees, no cancellation fee and no voice authorization fee. The cost-per-sale rate is 3.95 percent. A new feature offers the ability to view up-to-date statements of phone transactions by logging into a secure, online merchant control panel.

Asian Language E-Discovery Support

Kroll Ontrackhas announced the expansion of electronic discovery support for documents with Asian languages. Ontrack Inview 5.5 will streamline the review and production process, and help global legal teams identify, process, search, review and produce multilingual documents more quickly and efficiently. The expanded multilingual capabilities include languages such as simplified and traditional Chinese, Japanese and Korean.

Enhanced Document Production

Informative Graphics Corporationhas announced two new products, Brava Desktop and Redact-It Desktop, both of which work in tandem with WorkSite. Brava Desktop provides a single, simple viewing and collaboration interface for any file format, including Microsoft Word, Adobe PDF and TIFF. Brava has a full range of annotation tools and can publish files to PDF, TIFF or IGC’s secure Content Sealed Format (CSF) with embedded Visual Rights technology, allowing users to add an additional layer of security to the file—including an expiration date, password protection and feature restrictions like annotation, printing and more. Redact-It Desktop intelligently removes sensitive content and privacy information like social security numbers, names and phone numbers before making documents available to a wider audience. Also, Redact-It Desktop has a number of built-in macros for quick removal of privacy content, allows users to redact zones by simply drawing a basic box around an area, and can perform redaction by a simple search string or predefined text list.

Faster, More Effective E-Evidence Review

Cataphora, Inc.has released C-Evidence Version 4.3, with enhancements designed to further speed the electronic evidence review process and to support customer review requirements. The C-Evidence platform automatically finds the relationships among all the documents and all the people who created, received or interacted with them. Version 4.3 offers a significantly changed user interface and underlying functionality. The new user interface introduces a tabbed, task-based design, which provides improved orientation and navigation within C-Evidence. New features include user-customizable privilege log report generation and automatic flagging of messages sent from portable devices. In terms of underlying functionality, enhancements include performance improvements to the C-Evidence query mechanism, broader support for review of instant message logs, and improved internationalization capabilities. Administrative and reporting capabilities have also been extended.

Financial Reporting and Forecasting Aids

Elitehas introduced two additions to its Elite 3E financial and practice management software platform. Developed by Clarity Systems as part of the Elite 3E platform, 3E Financial Reporting consolidates data from multiple operating units, supports multi-currency and complex company structures, produces financial statements with complete drill-down capabilities and provides report bursting features. 3E Budgeting and Forecasting manages firm budgeting and planning to ensure accuracy, completeness and timeliness of the overall process. Both solutions provide seamless integration with 3E, Microsoft.NET architecture for Web access and support of international requirements.

3E Financial Reporting can convert financial data from multiple currencies to a single currency to better understand financial results from global operations. It also models complicated company structures and alternate hierarchies. 3E Budgeting and Forecasting contains a full set of budgeting drivers and calculation sets designed specifically for the legal market. Advanced business rules and modeling capabilities allow quick changes to assumptions or projections to calculate the financial impact. Users can create multiple versions, rolling forecasts and spreading patterns. 3E Budgeting and Forecasting is available now on 3E version 2.4. 3E Financial Reporting will be available in 2009.